Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1887-10-26
9oetieai. = Z. =.
FLIES IN THE OINTMENT.
NEEDLESS OFFEnSE GIVEN TO PA
IRONS OF The. DRAMA.
Popular Plays Disfgured without Res
soma Reformed Tom Jones"-The
Statue to the Bold Norseman Who
Discovered Americs-Gossip from Bos-
Especial Correspondence

Especial Correspondence,
Boston. Oct. %.
Dion Boucicault likes to get into print,
and the public need not object, for he is al
ways an Interesting gossip. Just now he is
given to praising the actors OF the day as
superior TO Those of the last generation, or
whatever generation it was that numbered
him among its youth. At the same time
he asserts that the playgoers are now fed
upon trivialities and sweetmeats in musiX
butooneiy instead of comedy, sensational
ism instead of tragedy, leg -shows instead
Of opera. So they are, but Boucicault
lays the bulk of the responsibility
upon the audience, while stating
that the latters taste was de-
bauched by the discovery forty years ago
of two new dramatic elements-the form of
buresque invented by Planche Dance and
their associates and the negro minstrel va
riety entertainment.
Recently he says, he has attempted to
give comedies OF the higher class, such as
1.-The Jilt. " The effect may be expressed
in the remark that saluted the effort
Charming delightful! When are you 60
ing TO give US The Shaughraun. Man
ayers III forming engagements with me sng-
gest that | should produce another melo
drama with sensation scene in it. Who
dictates this advice, | answer, the public
Mr.. Bouclcault talks very positively,
but the Boston public who crowded the
theater at each performance of "The Jilt'
last winter saw with disgust Mr. Boucicault
withdraw it that he might endeavor to
foist upon their support his newest play,
war drama that was originally entertain
ing, but had been manged by MIR. Bouci-
hal ba TnIOy inf 11pa fr,
funny business part for himself as Fin
MacCool" Fin was comparative
failure. Boucicault's other high class
comedy London Assurance" is almost as
reliable resource for local managers as
1.-The school for Scandal" Peg " offing-
tom or The Rivals - There is room for
suspicion that the theater managers are not
intelligent enough to know what the public
wants
Some of the greatest successes of recent
times in the local theaters have been gained
either with the Legitimate drama OF the
last or previous centuries, with such
bright modern plays well presented the
Madison Square series, Hazel kirke "
etc, prince Karl, p" "Jim the Penman,n
and the Gillette comedies, such as The
Private Secretary There is permanent
merit here mixed with farce and variety.
How the public loves the character drawing
in "Josh Whitcombn and "The Deacon's
Daughter
The fact is, there are in this city, what
ever there may be elsewhere, two distinct
classes of theater patrons, and managers
can ill their CASH. boxes from the POCKETS
of either at will. But there is this differ
ence-the people who want an elevated
drama will stay at home if they cannot get
it. But the people who deliberately prefer
sensuous and sensational exhibitions Will
pay for comedy if they cannot get horse
play.
Appeals TO the lower passions of human
nature for the success of the theater are
nothing new, but queer thing noticeable
about several of the popular plays OF the
day is that though they are, i'll the main,
written for respectable and conscientious
audiences there are occasionally, without
any apparent need INTERCEPTED scenes which
are fit only for a dance house gathering to
look upon. 1t would seem enough, for the
purposes of art, to suggest the vices that
underly the characters action, but TO put
upon the stage realistic scenes III the resorts
OF women of the town is going little too
tar isn't it?
The device of putting an innocent woman
into compromising situation appears to be
main reliance OF the dramatIsts of the day.
Boucicault does it i'll his play of 'Ihryne
the Romance of a Young " ife." which is
on at the TOLLS Street theater this week
However he avows that he is content to
sing my simple, clean strains to the sympa-
thies, rather than to the passions" perhaps
there is no harm i'll it.
but why, in an otherwise notfeusive
play, should pure girls and high
minded other people be called on,
at the performance of Run of
Luck to watch two scenes in a high toned
house of assignation, one an exhibition of
brazen women IN fine dress, and
the other an incident in an adj
joining room i'll which a fast young
man and an innocent damsel
figure. The affair comes so near the verge
OF RAPE that it would not be strange if some
gallant man or motherly woman from the
country should rush upon the stage In de-
Tense of the threatened girl one of these
nights.
Rices burlesque opera "The Corsair''
was a delight to the eye and ear; its music
its scenery and its scantlly clothed women
pretty.
only those seeking evil need find it IN
these facts, out, after all, is the common
use of the harem, with It's peculiar morals
and relations. as the scene of acton of
comic opera, wholly to ue approved
1t is far enough removed from the
realities of American life to afford a sutti-
GENTLY fancitul background for the operate
extravagances, but there is at least one
scene in The Corsair' that is positively in
decent in its suggestveness. 1 noticed that
matinee audience, conn osed largely of
women and children, enjoyed the whole
performance hugely. SO tar as can be
judged from appearance women pay even
greater tribute than men to female beauty
on the stage.
"Phryne'' is founded upon the misun-
derstandings and misfortunes growing out
of a marriage where the wife is neglected
by the husband, whose mind is wholly alb
sorbed 10y business This is no new ma
terial for the play wright, and there is moth
ing essentially original in Mr.. Boucicault's
han, r.,T,t